Warren - Detroit - Drainage Links

[MikeM]

I knew there would be more to it than just "providing information."

Good luck with all that Willi.

[Mikeg]

I knew there would be more to it than just "providing information."

Good luck with all that Willi.

+1


"I tell ya, it's all a conspiracy, man! GM not only killed the streetcars in Detroit, they're suppressing their role in flooding Macomb County and shutting down their own Tech Center for a week! And those bastards in Oakland County somehow figured out a way to use the laws of gravity to their advantage to make their shit and stormwater flow downhill!"

....The information being shared here is probably very useful, but could you please recommend a link to the "Rainwater and Sewage Overflow 101 & 102" courses, please? For us non-civil engineers, this thread is hard to follow.

mam2009 - it's really not all that complicated.

"Rainwater and Sewage Overflow 100":

A) There is a problem with the oldest sewer systems in Detroit and the inner ring suburbs, which were designed to carry both sewage and rainwater [[called "combined sewers").

B) The problem is that when it rains, the volume of additional water can often overwhelm the Detroit sewage treatment plant on the receiving end and they must send the overflow [[which contains diluted sewage) into the Detroit River. When this happens, the dumping is called a Combined Sewer Overflow [[CSO).

C) In the old days [[1920s-1950s), building combined sewers sort of made sense because the original sewage plants hardly cleaned up the sewage itself, much less the rainwater plus sewage. Also, communities did not have the acres of parking lots and miles of 5-lane roadways that came later and which contributes the majority of storm water run-off. Plus at the time it was considered too expensive to build a separate sewer system just to handle rain water.

D) Eventually Congress passed the Clean Water Act of 1972, which was a response to the nearly unchecked dumping of sewage and other pollutants into our waterways. At the time, two-thirds of the country's lakes, rivers and coastal waters had become unsafe for fishing or swimming. A big part of the problem came from dumping raw sewage during CSO events.

E) To comply with the Clean Water Act, cities have two choices:
1) prevent the storm water from getting into the sanitary sewers and overwhelming the treatment plants by building a new, separate storm sewer system [["very, very expensive"). The separate storm sewer system dumps rainfall into the existing open streams and rivers. Commercial and residential developments install their own open-air retention basins to prevent the storm sewer system from getting overwhelmed in a heavy rainfall situation. Since there is no longer a combined sewer system, there can be no more CSO events.
2) build retention basins into the existing combined sewer system to hold the additional rainfall and sewage and then release it to the sewage plant after the rain stops so that it doesn't get overwhelmed and have to do a CSO event at their end. [[just "very expensive").

F) Most communities choose the second option, however
1) you cannot possibly build enough retention basin capacity to accommodate the worst-case, once-in-a-century rainfall event. Therefore, they are typically designed to hold the rainfall from the more common "once-every-ten-years" rainfall event.
2) when you have a rainfall event that is bigger than the retention basin capacity was designed to hold, a retention basin has to dump the excess water somewhere, creating a CSO event upstream of the Detroit sewage treatment plant. A CSO at the Oakland County GHK retention basin is dumped into the Red Run/Clinton River, just inside the Macomb County line.
3) The EPA and Federal Courts typically approve these retention basins only as stop-gap measures. They oversee the CSO events, levy fines and demand additional retention basin construction to bring the local jurisdictions into closer compliance with the Clean Water Act.

[Willi]

Folks like Mikeg above, need to protect their employment, their family, - I get it , we all do.

Does anyone really think MacombCounty or Warren will
BITE the hand of General Motors or the U.S. Army TACOM LCMC,
when they both operate their own Sewage Treatment Facilities on site , flowing into the Clinton?

http://www.theoaklandpress.com/gener...gm-tech-center

Maybe people forgot about the Hazardous Toxic Harmful SuperFund Site aka WARREN Arsenal Tank Plant ?

That spaghetti mess of underground piping was on old blueprint paper, rarely updated, pages lost, etc., etc
for both facilities since the early 1950's - so the EPA, DEQ, alphabet soup agencies don't have a clue in 2014



The website for Bear Creek is so old, almost no one knows it exists
http://www.bearcreeknews.com/

Of 46 miles of drains in the Bear Creek watershed,
43 miles are enclosed, complicating the process of investigation

They like it that way -- out of sight and out of mind -- less questions, less to answer to

Warren has 11 SuperFund sites - and people think the Clinton River is clean ......

The government does the bare minimum, in a fascade, of ""protecting"" clean water.
When ordinary citizens create a ruckus, ask questions, FORCE change, then it happens.
Being quiet, apathetic, enjoying status-quo, oh well ya know attitudes change nothing.

If people in mass demand change - it occurs. Infrastructure costs money.
BUT thousands of folks took a financial gunshot-to-the-gut with this flood, they lost stuff,
and it's happened before and it will happen again as stormwater floods basements.

Hey Mikeg - what was the amount of FINES $$$$ General Motors
paid for the August flooding of CSO or Blended Effluent discharge into Bear Creek ?
Here is a look at the GM TECH Sewage Building, right next to the creek
http://redrundrain.files.wordpress.c...river-link.jpg
http://redrundrain.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/gm-tech-center-sewage-disposal.jpg
Pretty easy to solve the puzzle, right ?

An MS4 is a system of drainage
[[including roads, storm drains, pipes, and ditches, etc.)
that is not a combined sewer or part of a sewage treatment plant.
During wet weather, pollutants are transported
through MS4s to local waterbodies.
http://www.michigan.gov/deq/0,4561,7-135-3313_3682_3716-24366–,00.html

The Arsenal
http://redrundrain.files.wordpress.c...it-arsenal.jpg

The Detroit Arsenal Tank Plant, built in 1940,
was the first manufacturing plant to mass produce tanks
in the United States. The Tank plant closed in 1996.
The adjacent Detroit Army Arsenal is home to the
Tank/Auto Research Develop Engineer Center [[TARDEC)

Let me ask -- as an individual --- how much did the past flood cost you --- was it very expensive ?

mam2009 - it's really not all that complicated - pay out of pocket - or pay more taxes

[Scottathew]

1) you cannot possibly build enough retention basin capacity to accommodate the worst-case, once-in-a-century rainfall event.

Chicago is!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_and_Reservoir_Plan

[Willi]

Maybe its time for GM and Chrysler to pay-back-that-bailout
with funding for some 50 YEAR flood infrastructure around town.
IF they were sooooo precious to the economy of this nation
then they should take part in the infrastructure of it as well.

The Kresge Foundation was established here in Detroit in 1924,
and they are helping out Detroit with investments .....


Worth a read , regarding Bear Creek and Warren, making things happen.
http://www.toledoblade.com/JackLesse...ic-health.html

[Willi]

I wonder how many drains in Warren are ""hot""" in 2014
or when was the last time they were tested

[Willi]

[Scottathew]

That's a fascinating map, Willi! Thanks!

[Willi]

The DEQUINDRE Interceptor plays a key role in what goes to Detroit .

Southeastern Oakland County Sewage Disposal System S.O.C.S.D.S.
The entire flow from the S.O.C.S.D.S. enters the Detroit treatment plant
through the Dequindre Interceptor, which contains a master meter.

[Willi]

Your clean water probably comes down Dequindre Road as well,
as its the dividing like between the two counties





The Detroit Water & Sewer Department [[DWSD) easement that runs through
the G & H Landfill site contains a 96-inch clean water supply pipeline.
The clean drinking water supply line was constructed in 1967 and serves as
the main distribution from Lake Huron to the Detroit Municipal Water System.
* The DWSD 96 inch drinking water main has been completely submerged
by chemical groundwater/leachate on more than one occasion.*
Let’s hope there was no infiltration/inflow issues; it was built in 1967.
That’s a long time for leaks, cracks, splits, etc. to occur in the pipes.
People assume drinking water coming into their home is “clean”, “pure”, etc.

[Bluenote132003]

Willi,
You seem to have a lot of information on this, and it's very much appreciated! I had a thread on here a couple years back wondering about the massive [[and deep) construction project at 15 Mile and Gratiot. I believe we determined it was a probably a pumping station, possibly for one of the interceptor drains. Do you have any information or pictures on what was done there? Thanks!

[Willi]

The infamous break of the water main on 15 Mile Road in Sterling Heights
in Aug. 2004. The collapse created a 30-ft. deep, 60-ft. wide,
and 160-ft. long sinkhole, and released millions of gallons of
raw sewage into the upper middle-class community.
According to a 2005 DWSD publication, “The Fix for That Sinking Feeling,”
Inland Waters Pollution Control was the prime contractor on the repair job.
--Inland Waters, Ferguson Enterprise, and Lakeshore Engineering are all
cited in the “Kilpatrick Enterprise” indictments as involved in various
illegal activities aimed at soliciting contracts.

There have been three major collapses on the former Oakland Macomb Interceptor System,
two on the Romeo Arm Interceptor, now part of the Macomb Interceptor System
and one at the upper end of the ECI.
These failures all resulted from fine soil being washed into the interceptor
through cracks as small as 0.01 inch. Inflow and Infiltration.

The water table is only 5 to 20 feet below the ground’s surface;
while the sewer lines are buried 35 feet deep or more.
This results in significant water pressure,
acting on the outside of the plain concrete sewer pipes.

[Willi]

Understanding what average is , - how it affects your home , property and family -

[Willi]

In case someone was curious how the GWK Retention Basin works,
aka the 12 Town Drain , draining Oakland County through Warren.

[MikeM]

That's a collection of pictures and maps that doesn't explain how it "works."

[Islandman]

Lost Rivers documentary on IMDB:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2421498/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

[Willi]

It works on gravity, water flows downhill. The basis of all sewer systems.
MOST of what flows from the 12TownDrains in Oakland County is simply gravity driven
as it flows over the weir at the GWK Basin and on into the Clinton River .
The Dequindre Interceptor connection at GWK brings a large portion to Detroit for processing.
A little pumping here and there.....

Perhaps you want the movie version --


The massive basin is located at the site of the
Oakland County Red Oaks Youth Soccer Complex
on the west side of John R. Road, north of 12 Mile Road
[[29601 John R. Road, Madison Heights, MI 48071).



The interior of the GWK had sooooooooooo much rain in August
it basically flooded the underground facility and spilled out onto the dirt above.

[Scottathew]

Willi, The Kuhn video is a great watch!

Islandman, I've got the documentary on hold right now at the library, looks like it would be fascinating.

[Islandman]

48307, I've actually checked out the daylighting project done in Yonkers while waiting for Amtrak. It's featured in the documentary. It's really well done.

More here: http://daylightyonkers.com/

[Willi]

The problem is - people have short memories - and FLOODING occurs often.
It happens so often that people are almost ho hum to the fact infrastructure FAILS miserably

Sewer overflows are illegal - by law - fines involved - yet no one bats an eyelash in metro Detroit

No ONE is protecting you in government, not one entity, because it happens repeatedly
---- and we let the damn folks off the hook every year, instead of raising bloody hell
The DEQ, EPA and water quality folks are owned and operated by industry, bought off in effect